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Why do genius film artists like Norway's Jochim Trier make movies like "Sentimental Value"?

Why fill a movie screen with the pain some fathers and daughters have expressing their love?

That question crossed my mind as I watched the fragile drama unfold. But by the time it reached its precarious victory in the last scene, I had my answer.

Winner of this year's Grand Prize at Cannes, nominated for numerous Golden Globes, expect to see "Sentimental Value" up for a lot of Oscars, too, including Best Picture in English and Foreign Language.

Stellan Skarsgard delivers a masterful if maddening performance as Gustav Borg, who divorces his wife when his daughters are still young girls, but returns to the beloved family home for his ex-wife's funeral.

His reappearance rekindles unresolved resentments for the now grown Nora (Renata Reinsve) and her younger sister Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas). Then he adds some bombshell complications.

Gustav is a renowned filmmaker, now at the phase of his career where festivals honor him for his lifetime's work. Although he featured his younger daughter in one of his early masterpieces, she wisely made the decision not to go into the film business herself. Now she's a mother, a wife, and a relatively sane person.

It was older sister Nora who got the acting bug, and turned it into a somewhat successful career. She performs classic roles onstage, and her TV series did well. But all her talent comes at a price. High-strung is an understatement. Just getting her out of her dressing room and onto the stage before the curtain rises is a recurring ordeal her cast and crew mates have gotten used to.

Gustav hasn't made a movie in more than a decade, but he arrives back in his daughters' lives with a screenplay he's finally finished. It was inspired by memories of his mother, and he wants Nora to play the role.

She declines.

Just read it, he pleads.

No way, she says. (However you say that in Norwegian.) Complication No. 2: Daddy still owns the family home the daughters are so attached to. He neglected to sign it over to his wife when they divorced.

It's the setting he always had in mind writing his script. It's more than a setting, actually - it's a character, if not the star of his movie.

Not to share many more details, but Gustav Borg is an opinionated, strong-willed sort of fella - you know how those artistic types are. And so, after Nora's refusal, he finds another actress to play the role. She's Rachel Kemp, she's played by Elle Fanning, and she's as huge a screen star as, well, Elle Fanning.

That's the set-up. The interaction of the characters as they encounter, clash, love, hate and merge into each other weaves the fabric of the story.

It's probably sheer coincidence that "Sentimental Value" and George Clooney's "Jay Kelly" were released in the same awards season. Both tell the same story - the missing-in-action father who escaped into his brilliant filmmaking career rather than fulfilling the one role his daughters needed him to play.

Clooney's film is the glossy Hollywood version. "Sentimental Value" is the one that says all the things "Jay Kelly" can't. It's the honest, uncomfortable, beautiful, messy, real version.

Also like "Jay Kelly," it's a movie about making movies. Its insider sensibility is shaped by Gustav Borg's unassailable belief in his personal artistic vision. He's fond of "Oners" - scenes that go on for minutes, encompassing huge sweeps of action in a single take. He's sure his daughter is right for his script, but won't pay her the courtesy of watching her TV series or showing up to see her onstage.

You can imagine the effect of all this on temperamental Nora. Especially after he leaves her behind and tries to charm his way into the role of director/daddy for Rachel Kemp.

With the arduous vulnerability of acting such a major theme in "Sentimental Value," it's amazing to note how natural all the performances are. Elle Fanning's efforts to master her role is a movie within a movie within a movie. The actresses playing the sisters not only look alike, but share traits and mannerisms. Their bond is one of the film's joys.

And Skarsgard earns all the awards buzz coming his way for his prickly portrayal of a master artist.

As it turns out, movies are where Gustav Borg lives. His emotions, at least. Like Jay Kelly, the movies he makes are the one place he can find and reveal the love so elusive in his actual life.

Writer-director Trier shares Gustav Borg's tastes and exacting standards. The pregnant pauses in the dialogue and fades to black between scenes set the film's rhythm. The cinematography is gorgeous.

"Sentimental Value" is the opposite of "entertainment." It's the sort of movie we look into like mirrors to see ourselves.

Last year he played Bob Dylan. Now he's playing champion-level ping-pong.

Is there any challenge Timothée Chalamet can't master?

Then again, playing the role of Marty Mauser - otherwise known as "Marty Supreme" - is an act of supreme self-confidence.

Such chutzpah as they might say in the Lower East Side Jewish neighborhood where the fast-talking 23-year-old lives in his mother's apartment.

Loosely based on the life of Marty Reisman, a table-tennis champ and brash hustler in the early 1950s, director/co-writer Josh Safdie creates pitch-perfect period settings around Chalamet's performance that sucks all the air out of whatever room he's in.

The faces of the large cast add to the air of authenticity. With thick New Yawk accents coming out of their mouths, rarely have actors looked less like actors Losing at the Oscars last year, this role - that Chalamet spent seven years perfecting his game for - is a sure thing for an encore nomination.

In an awards season that has left me scratching my head at what dark comedy means, "Marty Supreme" seems a textbook illustration of the genre. And yet, IMDb.com - my guide to all things movie - labels it as an Epic ... Sport ...Period Drama ... Well yes, but ... There are a lot of laughs - some hilarious, some surreal - along the way. Not to mention, nonstop chaos on a pretty epic scale, too.

However you label it, it's a two-hour adrenaline rush as it follows Marty's globe-hopping fever dream of winning the international table tennis grand nationals. His path stretches from ghetto New York neighborhoods to London, Paris and Tokyo. He spends the movie earning, stealing, extorting or pleading for plane fare, entry fees and miscellaneous charges accrued along the way. (He has a fondness for living in luxury.) Marty Mauser is a unique cinematic creation, almost as heroic as he is annoying. Chalamet's portrayal is an instant classic, borderline iconic.

Safdie's fast-moving screenplay, co-written with Ronald Bronstein, surrounds Marty with supporters, victims, lovers, enablers, foils and dupes. (Some characters qualify on all counts.) The story opens with coitus (look it up) between Marty and Rachel Mitzler (Odessa D'Zion) in the backroom of a shoe store. Their on-again, off-again relationship is one for the books. For openers, she's married ... and almost as good as Marty himself when it comes to con games. D'Zion's energized performance conjures memories of Mikey Madison's Oscar-winning star turn in "Anora" last year.

Gwyneth Paltrow tops the co-star credits. She plays fading screen star Kay Stone, whose ice queen demeanor is no match for Marty's relentless pursuit. Kevin O'Leary plays the jerk she's married to, the ultrawealthy owner of a pen and ink company.

With the exception of Fran Drescher as Marty's hypochondriac ma Rebecca, most of the names in the cast aren't well-known. Which isn't to say the performances aren't terrific. They're gritty and street smart, like supporting characters with names like Keitel and Pesci in Martin Scorsese's early films.

It's not just a matter of fine acting, but also director Safdie's confidence and skill behind the camera. (With Benny Safdie's "The Smashing Machine" also in contention this movie awards season, it's been a very good year for the Safdie brothers.) As much as he's a player and a hustler, Marty Mauser is also a narcissist. Singlemindedly chasing his dreams leaves a lot of people having to pay the bills.

Seems like all of us are learning these days how it feels to be victims of narcissism run amok. Luckily, in Marty's case, he turns out to be capable of self-reflection ... and even empathy.

It all leads to a happy ending that no one could have seen coming, and puts "Marty Supreme" near the top of this reviewer's favorite movies of the year.

Pairing Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson with Emily Blunt in 2021's "Jungle Cruise" was a stroke of casting genius.

Their comic bickering as they rode the rapids rekindled the chemistry of Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn on their own leaky boat called "The African Queen." Dwayne and Emily elevated the comedy up a notch or two from just being one more Disneyland ride spinoff.

Together again, the pair navigate far more treacherous waters in "The Smashing Machine," a biopic about '90s mixed martial arts and UFC champ Mark Kerr. The stars both got well-earned Golden Globe nominations for their efforts, but there aren't many laughs this time around.

Kerr's sport was a hybrid of wrestling, boxing, kicking and basically pulverizing one's opponent. The rule books of the various extreme-fighting sanctioning bodies, some in Japan, were always works in progress. Biting was ruled out relatively early, but not pummeling the face of someone on his back on the mat, or kicks to the head, resulting in the chronic neuropathy still affecting Kerr to this day.

As in last year's excellent "Iron Claw," the vicious opponents in the ring weren't the biggest demons Mark Kerr faced.

"A day without pain is a day without sunshine," he quips at one point. But his pain leads to painkillers which lead to addiction in the script by director Bennie Safdie. Equally challenging is Mark's relationship with his honey, Dawn Staples (Blunt).

In her perfect makeup and skintight wardrobe, Dawn is his biggest fan. They share a home in the Phoenix suburbs, and she's a regular at the gym. She's a real ring babe, but Mark balks at an actual ring, or kids.

Initially in the movie, she's utterly devoted to him and his career, a role made more difficult by his attitude when she doesn't get his smoothies exactly right. But over the course of the film, especially after he gets sober and she doesn't, their knock-down drag-outs result in lots of broken home furnishings.

Mark Kerr was the subject of an acclaimed 2002 documentary also called "The Smashing Machine," when the sport was new and he was in his prime. His personality and charm were as compelling as his talents in the ring, so the role was a natural fit for Johnson. Under a full head of black hair, with prosthetics reshaping his face, he melds into the role with the assurance of a veteran, uh, actor.

In an interview, he credited Emily Blunt with giving him the confidence to move out of his ultra macho comfort zone to reveal vulnerability and other chinks in the armor. He pulls off the new act surprisingly well, and his chemistry with his co-star registers as strongly as it did their first, more light-hearted time around.

Blunt's performance is ... perfect. Seems like she doesn't know how to play a role any other way.

The performances aren't the problem with "The Smashing Machine." Real life is. Real life, as a rule, doesn't fold itself neatly into the three-act structure of, say, a fight classic like "Rocky." The plot is limited by the fact that Mark Kerr is a real, still-alive person (who actually shows up in the final scene). His greatest triumph wasn't in the ring, but in conquering addiction. His relationship with Dawn Staples was a whole lot messier than your standard Valentine card.

While there's plenty of action, and plenty of blood, it doesn't gel into a triumphant freeze frame at the end. Indeed, the last developments in the plot have to be summed up in text before the end credits roll You will be happy to know, though, that the real Mark Kerr was able to escape the vicious world that could have killed him, and land a job selling Toyotas in Phoenix.